Jules grimaced. “That’s the worst kind.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not playing morality police. Crowley is growing impatient, as you well know.” Zaria referenced one of her father’s former clients with a sigh. Just last week, he’d sent his lackey along with the warning that the next time he saw her without the explosive in hand, he’d break both of hers. “And he’s not the only one, but I’ve just used the last of my soulsteel.”
“Shit.”
“Shit,” Zaria agreed, using the desk to push herself up. Her hands vibrated against the wood, and she squeezed her fists tightly, hoping Jules wouldn’t notice.
It was a futile hope. His eyes snapped downward, lips clamping together to form a tight line. “Maybe you should stop for a while.”
“Stop what?”
“You know what. Do you really want to end up like your father?”
Zaria didn’t want to have this conversation again. It had been a while since Jules last suggested she cease practicing alchemology, but her frustration surrounding the topic hadn’t diminished. So what if her mouth was still bone-dry and the back of her throat tasted like bile? Apart from Jules, magic was all she had. If she suddenly quit, who knew when the kingpin—who ensured the terms of dark market deals were adhered to—would darken the pawnshop’s doorstep?
What she needed was a primateria source. Though the price and availability of soulsteel was prohibitive enough, Zaria’s more pressing concern was the toll creating primateria took on her health. She didn’t want to die the way her father had: drained, weak, and with little to show for her efforts.
There was a theory that Hohenheim had created three sources of magic before his death, desperate for his discovery to live on afterhis passing. In fact, many alchemologists believed that this was what had killed him. Despite Itzal’s wholehearted belief in the sources, Zaria had always been skeptical. Her father had spent years trying to track one down and never came across anything of note. Eventually, his obsession had faded to acceptance, and one fateful night he’d destroyed all his research in a rage.
Now, years too late, Zaria understood his feverish hope. She had dozens of commissions to fulfill, and they were pulling life from her faster than she could create them. If she could create magic without drawing from her own energy, it would change everything.
“I can’t juststop,” she told Jules, injecting all her frustration into the words. “I owe your father money. I promised you I’d get us out of Devil’s Acre. Would you rather I take up a job in a factory making a shilling a week? Do you want my clients to keep knocking at our door?”
“My father might be more understanding than you think.”
“We both know he doesn’t like me. Besides, he can’t be understanding if he’s dead.”
Jules crossed his arms. “And what ifyou’redead, Zaria? How the hell does that help either of us?”
It didn’t, of course. “That’s a risk I have to take. You know full well there’s no other option.”
“We could just… run. Go anywhere else, even if we don’t have a plan.”
“With no jobs, no money, and no clientele base? Are you prepared to leave your father on his own, vulnerable to whoever comes here searching for me?”
Jules sank heavily onto Zaria’s bed, and she knew that she had him. It brought her no joy.
“I’m sorry.” She meant it. She possessed the unfortunate tendencyto speak before thinking, her thoughts forever poised on the tip of her tongue. “But I know my limits, and I need you to trust me.”
His only reply was an exceedingly rude gesture. Zaria swatted his arm, flopping down on the bed beside him. The familiar warmth of his body was a comfort. She and Jules had spent many a night here after Itzal’s death, backs pressed together as his breath lulled her to sleep. That was before George Zhao declared them too old to be sharing a bed and banished his son back upstairs. After that, Zaria had slept alone with an ever-present candle to drive the demons away.
But now, with her friend’s slim frame silhouetted by the dark, she could almost imagine he’d never left. Suddenly, they were ten again, telling secrets in the orange-limned dark, voices pitched low so as not to wake Itzal.
The collar of Jules’s shirt was threadbare, the sleeves a little too short, and Zaria was struck all at once by just how tired he looked. She wasn’t the only one working hard. She wasn’t the only one suffering. Jules worked long hours in the pawnshop, dealing with all manner of unpleasant folk, and saw his future stretched out before him like some grim shadow in a looking glass.
Jules’s grandfather had started the pawnshop years ago; he had been a sailor from mainland China who had brought his family to settle in London upon growing weary of the sea. Both Jules’s grandparents had lived on the top floor of the pawnshop until the fever took them six years ago, hisnai naiwithin a month of hisye ye. Zaria had never known anyone to work harder and remembered them both fondly. But running this place in the heart of the slum made for a difficult life, and Zaria knew Jules dreamed of more.
And yet.And yet.She couldn’t abide his incessant worryingabout her—didn’t want him to point out the things she was trying so very hard not to think about.
“You’re running yourself ragged,” Jules said, as if he could hear her thoughts, pressing his bony shoulder into hers. “You can’t blame me for not wanting to watch you destroy yourself. But I’ll try to trust you. Just… promise you’re not doing it for me.”
Zaria’s head was still spinning, her muscles one generalized ache, but she cracked a wry smile. “Not everything is aboutyou, Jules.”
He rolled his eyes. “My poor ego.”
It was a lie, though, Zaria thought. Of course everything was about Jules. How could it not be? He was all she had. He kept her sane and gave her a reason to wake each morning. She would not allow herself to die, because she couldn’t abide the thought of leaving him on his own.
“If we could leave right now, where would you go?” she asked, tilting her chin toward the ceiling. “If money wasn’t an object and you could go anywhere you pleased.”
